Dali chief engineer reaches deferred prosecution deal over 2024 Key bridge collapse

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON, June 18 (Reuters) – The chief engineer of the cargo ship Dali that destroyed Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge in a March 2024 collision that killed six construction workers reached a deferred prosecution agreement, the government said on Thursday.

The Justice Department said Karthikeyan Deenadayalan admitted to failing to report a hazardous condition to the U.S. Coast Guard, including that he was aware the 984-foot ship used an unsafe fuel supply pump. Last month, a federal grand jury indicted two foreign operators and a shoreside superintendent in the incident.

Deenadayalan, an Indian national, will face 36 months of probation and, if he complies with the terms of the agreement, will not face prosecution.

Last month, Maryland reached a final settlement of $2.25 billion with Grace Ocean Private Limited and Synergy Marine Pte Ltd, the owner and operator of the Dali.

The Justice Department ​said the collision caused at least $5 billion in damage and significant environmental damage. The National Transportation Safety ⁠Board last year found a single loose wire in the electrical system caused a breaker to unexpectedly open, launching a sequence of ​events that led to two vessel blackouts and a loss of propulsion and steering.

Maryland has not resolved claims against the shipbuilder, Hyundai Heavy Industries.

The Dali’s operators – Synergy Marine Pte Ltd, based ​in Singapore, and Synergy Maritime Pte Ltd, based in Chennai, India – along with Radhakrishnan Karthik Nair, 47, an Indian national who worked for both firms as the technical superintendent for the Dali, were charged in the incident.

Prosecutors said Nair is believed to be in India.

The two Synergy companies said ​in a statement they would defend themselves against the charges. Synergy Marine said it was troubled the Justice Department has kept the Dali crew members in the U.S. for over two years “despite evidence that their actions were timely and reasonable under the circumstances.”

The Justice Department said the defendants are accused of relying on a flushing pump to supply fuel to two of the Dali’s four generators, but ​the flushing pump was not designed to automatically restart following a blackout, ​and the Dali’s generators could not operate without a fuel supply.

The indictment alleged that if the Dali was using proper fuel supply pumps, the vessel would ​have regained power in time to safely navigate under the bridge.

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Lincoln Feast)